Overview

The University of Maryland (UM) houses a broad range of pre-clinical and clinical science resources and core laboratories that support translational research. Although core facilities are recognized as a cost-effective mechanism to support cutting edge research, as like many other institutions, they tend to be siloed within a specific academic center, program, department or school with uneven access (and many times lack of knowledge by faculty of their existence). Challenges to use of these facilities have included fragmented administration, disparate locations, poor marketing, unclear access, and cost. Based on the great need for user-friendly high-quality accessible state-of-the-art core services that are cost-effective, a centralized mechanism across all ICTS-participating institutions for organizing, coordinating and delivering core services for clinical and translational research would be highly beneficial. The multidisciplinary and collaborative research environment at UM will be considerably enhanced by centrally organizing and managing these resources, while providing the necessary tools to educate clinical and translational investigators about the technologies, their power, and their applications.

With this goal in mind, we have developed the following Specific Aims for the Translational Technologies Network Resource.

Specific Aim 1

To establish the UM ICTS Translational Technologies Network Resource, a new framework for a centralized institution-wide core service resource to facilitate and accelerate high impact clinical and translational research.

Develop a centralized administration for the TTN Resource to provide effective support for the Core and Network resources, develop a fair and consistent user fee structure, and formulate policies that uniformly address prioritization, management, and operation of each of the Core facilities.

Provide a new physical infrastructure to co-locate many interactive core and resource facilities.

Provide a new integrated web based “one stop shopping” portal for UM ICTS investigators to request and receive data from TTN core facilties.

Specific Aim 2

Create synergies between the TTN Resource and other UM ICTS Programs and Resources to capitalize on existing ICTS strengths and strengthen the overall mission of the ICTS.

The TTN Resource administration will interface with other ICTS Programs and Resources to facilitate their missions including clinical and translational research (Participant and Clinical Interactions Resource), support of pilot grants (Pilot and Collaborative Translational and Clinical Studies Program), integration of novel translational methodologies (Novel Methodologies in Translational Research Program), support education (Education, Training and Career Development Program), and community outreach (Community Engagement and Research Resource. The Clinical and Translational Research Informatics Resource and Design, Biostatistics and Quantitative Research Resource will provide informatics and biostatistics support for efficient operation and integration of the TTN Resource and to assist investigators by providing advanced analysis in a biological context.

Specific Aim 3

Provide education and technical consulting to accelerate the pace of discovery in basic and translational research, clinical trials, practice and community based interventions.

Conduct educational programs and open forums for investigators to disseminate information about how the capabilities of the TTN Resource can enhance their clinical and translational research and create new transdisciplinary synergies to accelerate the pace of discovery.

Establish a TTN Resource Advocacy Committee, comprising investigators from each of the representative ICTS-participating institutions, to help integrate the Core Networks across the ICTS, promote multidisciplinary collaborative research efforts, and guide the TTN Resource in new avenues of expansion.

Establish a consult service for ICTS investigators who wish to learn about and use a TTN Resource Core service.

Organize the annual Translational Technologies and Resources Symposium, and assist in the organization of translational technologies bidirectional community education and outreach.